The Android improvement crew in the present day introduced the primary beta for the upcoming Android 16, which is anticipated to be launched in Q2 of 2025.
At the moment, it’s anticipated that Android 16 will attain platform stability in March, at which level the Android crew will ship the ultimate SDK and NDK APIs in addition to closing inside APIs and app-facing system behaviors.
“This construct consists of assist for the way forward for app adaptivity, Stay Updates, the Superior Skilled Video format, and extra. We’re trying ahead to listening to what you assume, and thanks upfront to your continued assist in making Android a platform that works for everybody,” Matthew McCullough, VP of Product Administration for Android Developer at Google, wrote in a weblog submit.
To raised assist adaptive apps — apps that change layouts primarily based on the scale of the display — the Android crew has determined to start phasing out the flexibility for apps to limit display orientation and resizability for big screens. For screens which might be bigger than 600dp extensive, apps concentrating on API stage 36 can have app home windows that resize, and subsequently, it is suggested builders test their apps to make sure the UI scales seamlessly.
The Android crew can also be introducing Stay Updates, that are notifications that assist “customers monitor and shortly entry vital ongoing actions.” There’s now a ProgressStyle notification template that can be utilized to construct a lot of these notifications for rideshare, supply, and navigation. Stay Updates assist customized icons for begin, finish, and present progress monitoring, segments and factors, consumer journey states, milestones, and extra.
Digicam and media updates in Android 16 embody assist for the Superior Skilled Video (APV) code and night time mode scene detection to assist apps determine when to change to and from night time mode within the digital camera.
This launch will even embody low-level assist for rendering and measuring textual content vertically, which is beneficial for languages that use a vertical writing system, like Japanese.
And eventually, this launch consists of new accessibility updates, together with the flexibility to offer textual content a few ViewGroup with out overriding details about its kids, and the addition of setFieldRequired to AccessibilityNodeInfo, which permits apps to inform an accessibility service that enter to a type subject is required. “This is a crucial state of affairs for customers filling out many kinds of kinds, even issues so simple as a required phrases and circumstances checkbox, serving to customers to constantly establish and shortly navigate between required fields,” McCullough wrote.
In keeping with the Android improvement crew, with this launch, any supported Pixel gadget is ready to get this replace over-the-air. If a Pixel gadget isn’t out there, builders can use the Android Emulator in Android Studio.
